Palm | Kelapa Sawit

ADDING VALUE TO PALM OIL
THERE IS MORE TO PALM OIL THAN BANGA SOUP
Did you know that there is more to palm oil than just “banga soup”?
It’s OK, I know that when you add stock fish or fresh fish to banga and add other ingredients, you may have a treat of starch or fufu, or pounded yam with banga soup depending on which side of the Niger you live, but I’ll tell you a short story.
Some time back in the late 20th century, some folks at NIFOR near Benin City found out that if you arrange a marriage between “okpuruka” which they call Dura in scientific English and “osukwu” - which they call pisifera in scientific English then the child of this marriage is called “tenera” which in Igbo we call “nkwu agriculture”.
Then some Scottish folk who were then working for “Unilever” liked these damsels and took some to Malaysia as ornamental trees to decorate their colonial homes in Malaysia and Indonesia.
But these damsels bloomed so well that they were adopted and given the citizenship of both countries. They flourished so well that they multiplied and their posterity in these two countries now number hundreds of millions. Their new fatherland loved them so much that they were allowed to fill and replenish the land with their offspring.
Now their descendants are so integrated into the land that they are contributing so much to the economic development of these two lands.
But what is the case in Nigeria and other West African countries from where these Malaysian damsels hailed? Brother or sister, a prophet is not without honour except in his or her own home!!!
These damsels are so honoured and respected in Malaysia and Indonesia that they are now dressed up as beautiful damsels whose values are well known and who are shown off around the world as ambassadors and economic representatives all over : in the USA, in China, in Europe and even back in their original country of birth in West Africa.
Is there a lesson for us here at home from these cousins who are now making waves all over the world? Perhaps if we got to know the value of the ones remaining behind and learnt to ADD VALUE to their fruits and seeds we could benefit from the lessons to be learnt and perhaps cease from our regular trips to Abuja to fight over the proceeds from the sale of crude oil. Perhaps we may even learn how to ADD VALUE to the crude petroleum oil with which we are also blessed instead of just exporting and selling it and coming to Abuja to fight over the proceeds. We may even produce many more products to sell that just crude petroleum.
In my next post I will go into more detail of what can be done to the palm oil to produce more marketable products which can be sent into the world market to compete with our friends from Malaysia and Indonesia.
But first, let us see how many hectares of palm plantations are in place in these two countries in contrast to how many in Nigeria.
To quote a Wikipedia article on “oil palm”
“The African oil palm was introduced to Sumatra and Malaya area in the early 1900; many of the largest plantations of oil palms are now in this area, with Malaysia growing over 20,000 square kilometers. Malaysia claims that in 1995 it was the world’s largest producer with 51% of world production. The Malaysia has exported more than 13 million metric tons of palm oil worth more than $10 billion in 2007 according to government estimates”
“The world’s largest producer and exporter of palm oil today is Malaysia producing about 47% of the world’s supply of palm oil. Indonesia is the second largest producer of palm oil producing approximately 36% of world palm oil volume. According to US Department of Agriculture, since 2005 Indonesia became the world’s largest producer of Crude Palm Oil (CPO). Both nations are expanding their palm oil production capacity and the market continues to grow. Worldwide palm oil production during 2005-2006 growing season was 39.8 million metric tons of which 4.3 million metric tons was in the form of palm kernel oil. It is thus by far the most widely-produced tropical oil, and constitutes 30% of total edible oil production worldwide”.